


Upside Down & Inside Out

by Kuruccha



Category: Space ☆ Dandy
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-21
Updated: 2016-03-21
Packaged: 2018-05-28 04:11:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,375
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6314722
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kuruccha/pseuds/Kuruccha
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>(It’s highly improbable it has already happened.) (Isn’t it?)</i>
  <br/>
  <i>(Maybe it’s just something he dreamt of.)</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Upside Down & Inside Out

**Author's Note:**

  * A translation of [Upside Down & Inside Out](https://archiveofourown.org/works/6100464) by [Kuruccha-IT (Kuruccha)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kuruccha/pseuds/Kuruccha-IT). 



> Two episodes of this show are absolutely essential to understand what's going on: first one is nr. 23, _Lovers are trendy_ , and second one is the last, _Neverending Dandy_. Without the first this whole thing won't have much of a sense. Without the latter, story mechanics will be quite nebulous.  
>  Title is from the omonimous song by OK GO. Their lyrics go so well with this fandom.  
> (I put some Cowboy Bebop references here and there ;D Can you spot them?)  
> Please enjoy! Hope you'll have a good time reading.

Looks like it's time to decide.  
Are you here?  
Are you now?  
Is this it?  
_All of those selves that you tried;  
_ wasn't one of 'em good enough?

[Upside Down & Inside Out - OK Go]

 

 

 

“A common alien from M87 nebula.”

“So you are from M87, uh?”

“It’s not rare at all…”

“Another useless one. We’ll keep on starving.”

Dandy is so used to Meow’s comments he doesn’t even have the energy to sigh. (Well, maybe Meow’s words would have been way more pregnant, if he just didn’t comment while tagging his photos on Instagram.) (Maybe that’s exactly why nobody listens to his chatters anymore.) (Even though they’d better do, as now they barely have money enough to a tank filling for Aloha Oe.) (But QT is not sighing, and that’s a good omen. It means there’s still hope.) (He doesn’t know where and when and how QT learned to sigh, but Dandy can swear he’s able to.) (He has such a vivid memory of it.) (Maybe it’s just something he dreamt of.)

“Please wait, you three. Do you want an easy job?”

 

* * *

  

“Your boyfriend?!” 

Scarlet nods. On their worn out sofa aboard Aloha Oe she looks so out of place, so elegant and haughty and so superior to all of them.

“I promised my parents I’d be back during summer holidays, this year at least” she unfolds with a pedantic tone, like she had already told them that story a thousand times and once more. “Past years I’ve always pretended to be too busy, but last august I made up some imaginary boy and his elusive parents as an excuse, and now they want to meet him.”

“So you’re just trying to frame me.”

“I’ll pay you. 750 uron per hour.”

“It’s a pittance!”

“We’re in!” it’s QT’s answer, and way before Dandy could protest he starts emitting receipts and weird clatters and noises that don’t sound like sighs at all.

“I wonder how many cool photos you’ll take during this vacation” says Meow, pushing something on his cell phone screen. An hashtag, most probably. “Tag me, won’t you?”

“I have no intention of…” he answers, and while he’s doing it he has some strange feeling. (It’s like a weird déjà-vu.) (Something like that, that’s it.) (But he’s sure something like that never happened to him before.) (He would remember, if he had been on vacation with Scarlet already. Isn’t it?) (It’s highly improbable it has already happened.) (Maybe it’s just something he dreamt of.)

“We’ll be on our way tomorrow morning. At five o’clock” she concludes.

 

* * *

 

At four o’clock they’re on their way.

“I brought some coffee” says Scarlet, pulling out a thermos from god only knows which pocket of her bag. It’s an enormous case, with a long belt to keep it on shoulder, so filled with things the stitching thread is tight and its holes on the lower side are widening. (It’s made with some kind of waterproof fabric; Gore-Tex, maybe? Is it? Dandy can’t remember – maybe that wasn’t its name, maybe it doesn’t even have one, and it’s not like he needs to know.) It’s a sports bag. A basketball player one, maybe. Not surely fitted for a woman. Not surely fitted for Scarlet.

“If you don’t want it now you can drink it later” she says, and the thread of Dandy’s thoughts get lost. But it’s four in the morning, and he’d be curious to find somebody with the guts to scold him. Just to have the satisfaction to defend himself and punch him, obviously.

Dandy grumbles something unintelligible. “Later” he says then, noticing Scarlet and the thermal plastic cup she’s still handing him, and this time she gets it and sips the coffee on his behalf.

“Just remind me where we’re heading” he says, turning on his seat on the touring spacecraft to get a better position. His shoulders are numb; the shirt he’s wearing folded on weird spots against the rough cloth of the backrest. (And the weirdest thing is he doesn’t even know where the shirt came from; he found it on his wardrobe and wear it just to gain a semblance of seriousness.) (Maybe QT bought it somewhere. Certainly on the timeframe when he was having those issues with ocular filters. That would explain the pink.) (He really doesn’t remember, though. QT must have asked him back the uron he spent, at least.) (Maybe he just forgot.)

“Nebula E23” says Scarlet, and Dandy’s thoughts are interrupted again, and he realizes he needs to sleep so bad, a few more hours at least. “It’s a work meeting, don’t you remember? You’re my boyfriend and you’re working on Space Patrol.”

“Boyfriend” he repeats. “Meaning I can do what boyfriends usually do?”

“Moderate physical interactions only” she answers, and Dandy realizes that’s another sentence he’s sure he has heard already. (With that tone and that voice.) (Really.) (It was Scarlet, no doubt.) (It’s not a sentence that could be used on a R-rated movie, that’s it, but still it’s something she could have said in one of Dandy’s wet dreams.) (Yes, that’s it, he tells himself. Maybe it’s just something he dreamt of.)

“How long ‘till we’re there?”

 

* * *

 

They disembark and they queue up for luggage; Dandy need to pick up three different bags as he never travels without his belongings, and his belongings are roughly equivalent to everything his cabin on Aloha Oe can contain.

Scarlet travels light; just a black pochette, (one of those with a string to tie it to the wrist, just like the one Honey asked him as a present), and that’s because Scarlet is a well-organized woman and she provided to deliver all she would have needed to their hotel.

“Aren’t you done yet?”

“One is still missing” he answers, rising on his tiptoes to investigate the luggage walking belt. His third bag – the one of the very same yellow of his spaceship paint; the one with the cloth patches he bought that one time on Betelgeuse, so many years ago, when he still used to wear flip flops on winter too; past times gone – won’t appear, and Dandy is tired, as they departed at three in the morning and now it’s nine in the evening and they didn’t even serve a meal onboard and he just wants to arrive at the hotel. He should have delivered all of his baggage too.

“Maybe I’d better call a taxi. So it’ll be here already.”

“Did it” she says, and suddenly Dandy is so tremendously grateful to have her as travelling companion, as he’s sure Meow – it’s an example; just an example, a random one – would have never thought of doing such a wise and provident thing as calling a taxi before someone else pulled up the subject. (Maybe QT would. But QT works on battery, and his battery is always low at urgent times like that.)

“Thanks” he answers in all sincerity.

She waves her hand in front of her face; an universal language to make him understand that no, it’s nothing special, really. (With “universal” Dandy means it’s universal for real, as it’s some kind of non-verbal language human beings share with other alien species.) (Those species who own hands, at least.)

Dandy is about to tell her – just for conversation, without ulterior motives; they’re at spaceport, they need to do nothing else but wait, so the least they can do is to fill that space – when Scarlet’s hand runs through her dark red hair and loosen the bun that kept them trapped for the whole day, freeing a fall of threads on her shoulders that turns her in a whole different person, and Dandy feels again like he’s that teenager that wore flip-flops and didn’t know how to relate with others, and so bought cloth patches as gifts to give when he was back from his trips.

But he’s no teenager, and he wears no flip-flops. (Though he’d keep on buying cloth patches.) He stopped being shy a decade ago.

“You’re beautiful with your hair down” he says, and Scarlet’s fingers run fast on the locks still covering her forehead. A glimpse of a smile curls up her lips and Dandy thinks that expression suits her better than her usual huffy expression, but that’s something he’s not sure it’s appropriate to tell.

(He has a feeling he saw her laugh already – laugh uproariously, even, and he has the impression he was younger and lighter.) (Though not as young and light and his flip-flops wearing teenager self.) (And that’s because he hadn’t meet her so many years ago; they first met at Alien Registration Center.) (Isn’t it?) (Maybe he knew her even before.) (Maybe they had been knowing each other for years and he hadn’t understand who she is yet.) (Maybe she wasn’t laughing for real.) (Maybe it’s just something he dreamt of.)

“Hey, the yellow one down there. Isn’t that your bag?”

 

* * *

  
“Scarlet.”

He calls her with low voice, conspiratorially. He’s sure he seems at least 35% more badass now he’s wearing sunglasses.

“What’s up” she replies, laconically, like she’s used to the words that are going to come out of his mouth.

“I found a non-registered alien.”

“And?”

“And then I’m gonna bring him over.”

“No way.”

“I’m an alien hunter.”

“Not during this trip.”

“But…”

“ _No way_ ” she answers, still on her place, ready to scold him before taking another step. “If we’re here it’s because one of those alien you brought over as a non-registered one,” and she stops to mimic a pair of quotation marks with her fingers, “Turned out being the heir of one of the most influent families of the whole North-East quadrant of C49 nebula. The same family which claimed formal apologies by _you_ hunter, and by our registration society _as well_.”

“I know. You’ve been repeating it for three whole days.”

“And yet it didn’t get into that brain of yours.”

“It did” he replies. “It’s just this one doesn’t look like a sissy gentleman at all. It’s just a non-registered alien.”

Scarlet sighs and the sound she makes while air exits her nose reminds Dandy of QT and of his unusual way of making him understand That Is Not A Good Moment For Them All.

(She looks familiar, though, as angry as she’s now.) (But it’s a different kind of anger if compared of that she always shows at Alien Registration Center, as this is an anger implying way more interaction than usual.) (But he’s sure QT isn’t implied in this.) (And then he suddenly realizes, _Chuck!_ , _it was Chuck!_ , Chuck’s the one always breathing through his nose just a moment before attacking with his mortal karate techniques!, and all of a sudden it’s _so obvious_ Scarlet knows Chuck, because which other reason would she need to sigh like that?) (He was sure, so absolutely sure she loved Chuck.) (Even though he doesn’t know why.) (Maybe he imagined it after seeing that whirling of her long legs and karate moves.) (But when?) (Where?) (In a dream, maybe.)

(He’d love to tell her.)

“Let’s get moving” she says, and she hurries up.

 

* * *

  

“I can’t believe it!” she says, “Karate Kommandos? _That_ Karate Kommandos?”

“ _Exactly_ that Karate Kommandos.”

“But it’s so rare and…”

“I own a copy. On a VHS.”

(He’s always been more of a Betamax type, to be honest.) (But Chuck was well worth that sacrifice.) (Luckily, there are still planets specialized on vintage garbage floating around.)

Scarlet’s eyes lightens up and her lips hatch and Dandy realizes he would really like to have that Karate Kommandos VHS in his hands right now, because in the whole space immensity he had never found anybody who loved Chuck as much as he does, and Scarlet looks like the perfect woman on the perfect moment – and with her hair loose on her shoulders she’s even more beautiful than usual, and he doesn’t even remember if he had ever told her before.

“We can watch it together” he suggests, “When we’ll be back from the trip. We have a VHS reader aboard Aloha Oe.”

(Everything’s so good it’s like a dream come true.) (Or maybe he’s just dreaming.) 

“I’m in” is her answer.

 

* * *

 

 

“So you’ve been together for five years.”

“Six. Almost.” Scarlet intrudes before Dandy could open his mouth to answer. “In two months and a half.”

“It’s a long time” comments Scarlet’s ex-classmate, stretching out on the table to regain the beer pitcher. (She has a nice pair of boobs, moreover.)

“It is” she comments, and Dandy can distinctly feel Scarlet’s thigh push against his jeans. He had some doubts even before, but now he’s absolutely sure he can’t resist to that tiny miniskirt.

“Any plan on wedding day yet?” asks another girl. She’s drunk, she’s been sitting next to him the whole night, and her tone is acid and poor, and by the way she acts Dandy guesses she might be Scarlet’s ex best friend now turned to worst enemy; the one they talked about the night before, when they watched _Clap of Thunder_ together on TV and Scarlet compared her to the Gojira monster Chuck needed to annihilate. (Being honest, her appearance is way different; but it’s a matter of substance, and substance always remains the same.) (She trusts Scarlet’s judgments. There’s nobody who can like Chuck’s movie and be a bad person at the same time.) (Surely not Scarlet.)

“No, we didn’t set any date yet” he answers, with his arm surrounding Scarlet’s shoulder to bring her closer. “And that’s not exactly how I planned to ask it. But the timing is perfect.”

The ex-classmates don’t understand; nobody does, not even Scarlet. And surely didn’t her ex-best-friend-now-worst-enemy as well, the one Scarlet wanted to annihilate showcasing her happiness. That’s the reason of their trip, isn’t it?

“I don’t even have a ring” he adds, looking her straight in the eyes, and Dandy thinks she’s incredibly beautiful and incredibly perfect, and that maybe his proposal is not that much of a fake, as he wouldn’t matter being together with her, even though he has no idea of what exactly a married couple would do. (Aside from a lot of sex.) (Much of a lot of sex.) (He likes the idea. He does.)

He doesn’t wait for her answer – he didn’t even make a question, he notices, and her mouth is a breath from his and the distance is so short he doesn’t even bother closing his eyes. So he keeps them wide open, up to the moment he feels the taste of her lipstick on his tongue and the scent of her skin under his nostrils and everything’s so familiar he feels as if he was destined to that very moment from the beginning of times. (Then he shakes up because _come on_ , that’s way too much of a sloppy thought, and it doesn’t match with his character.) (But he lingers on that kiss way longer than in any kiss he gave before, before her.) (And he doesn’t stop when her ex-classmates starts to applaud them; when with his eyes shut close he can see the flash of the photos they’re taking to commemorate the moment.) (His fingers are glued to her back, just above the zipper of her skirt, and he wouldn’t be able to move them of a millimeter, not even with a superhuman effort.) (And it’s Scarlet the one breaking the enchant of that kiss, in the end, and it’s fortunate as he had no breath left.) (And that yes she murmurs on his lips is pronounced at such a low voice he almost can’t hear it; but he feels it distinctly, he does, and it’s like his hair bristle on his nape with excitement.) (And they’re not the only stiffening thing in his body.) (You just go with the flow, baby.)

Scarlet gets kidnapped by the happy chattering of her ex-classmates, but he sees a smile on her face – a nice smile, really – and that night is a dream, it can’t be but a dream, a dream he doesn’t want to wake up from. And everything’s permitted in dreams, so he would just like to get up and take her and bring her away, (where, who knows; far away, so far), with first Chuck’s movie ending theme as an epic background music, and Dandy is happy, he’s so happy even just considering such a thing, he is.

 

* * *

 

 

“There’s no need to be together today as well, if you don’t want to” says Scarlet. They’re having breakfast and Dandy still has his nose on his coffee mug, so he’s not able to elaborate any coherent thought. “Honeymoon is at its last day. Just to travel back.”

Dandy’s synapsis connect enough to remember the reason of that trip; a fake wedding, an honeymoon organized just to gain a permit she wouldn’t have been able to get otherwise, a vacation planned to attend the largest gathering of fans of Chuck. (That could easily be the event of the century, with original cast and everything. He’s still wondering how Scarlet could find the tickets.) (But the things he remember best from last night are her warm fingertips against his nape while he was kissing her, when for a moment he even forgot about Chuck.)

“Sure” he replies, laconically, swallowing a huge lump of saliva, because that kiss ended with a fire alarm siren and they never mentioned it again, and Dandy is not sure he should let it go. (Not sure at all.) (He has no intention.) (He forgot about Chuck, and Chuck was three meters away, and that should have a meaning for sure, isn’t it?)

Scarlet herself has the expression of one who just swallowed a huge lump of saliva as well, but Dandy’s never been good at reading other people, and he has ever learnt how to understand Scarlet either, so he doesn’t add a thing and they stay like that. They drink their morning coffees and they pack up.

He gets back on Aloha Oe and Meow and QT are happy to have him onboard again, so happy they don’t stop babbling for a single second, and they end up suggesting a trip to BooBies and _who am I to refuse?_ , he thinks, lying on his bed. It’s as small as a bulk if compared to the king-sized one at the hotel.

He recalls the plans he had for that night – honeymoon organization designed an aperitif time at some pretty good club, judging from its website, and more things he can’t remember– and suddenly, among all the things scattered on the floor, his Karate Kommandos VHS pops up and he’s not that much into BooBies for that night, because there’s something way better waiting for him, if he just has the guts to go and take it.

So he stands, picks up his VHS plastic case and goes, shoving his friends waiting for him at the door.

He has no idea of the address of that club, but he’ll search it on the way. He’s sure he read it online. It’s not like he dreamt of it.

 

* * *

 

  
“Just a common alien from M87 nebula.”

“So you are from M87, uh?”

“It’s not rare at all…”

“Another useless one. We’ll keep on starving.”

Dandy sighs, and Meow sighs, and QT sighs as well, and Dandy wonders how could a robot emit such a noise, as he doesn’t have lungs, technically speaking.

He’d like to ask him, but the guy in the queue behind them is snorting and badmouthing already, asking why they don’t move if they’re done, saying he’s in a hurry, and Dandy has to keep his tought for himself and give his way.

He has time to look at Scarlet, though – to show her every tiny piece composing his disappointment, he tells himself, but what he reads on the eyes greeting him is way different; he can’t understand what it is exactly, but he’s sure it’s something he’d like to experiment, something he’d be glad to take into consideration.

The automatic door closes in front of him, firm and final, and all that remains is the reflection of his face watching him from the polished metal, and everything else disappears.

Maybe it’s just something he dreamt of.


End file.
